SESSION: THE SOCIAL SELF: LOOKS AND CODES

From everyday ritual to social skill: The etiquette of greeting gestures in three Ming novels

Roland Altenburger

Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg (Wurtzbourg,Germany) — Roland Altenburger is Professor of East Asian Cultural History at the Julius Maximilian University of Würzburg since 2012. In 1997 he received his Ph.D. from the University of Zürich where he taught as Assistant and Associate Professor from 1999 to 2012. His research stays include Harvard University (1996-1998), National Central Library (1998), Peking University (2010), Academia Sinica (2017), and Sichuan University (2018). His main fields of research are Ming-Qing narrative literature, the cultural and social history of the late imperial period, regionalism and the representation of place in literature, and literary geography. His major publications include the monograph The Sword or the Needle: The Female Knight-errant (xia) in Traditional Chinese Narrative (Berne etc.: Peter Lang, 2009) and the co-edited volume Yangzhou, A Place in Literature: The Local in Chinese Cultural History (Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2015).

Abstract — In late imperial China, the competence to correctly perform the right greeting gesture in any social situation was considered an important aspect of daily ritual. It was a requirement to move in society, especially in elite circles. Contemporary everyday-life encyclopaedias, nevertheless, include surprisingly little information on greeting etiquette. This implies that the competence to perform greeting etiquette, as a relevant field of vernacular knowledge, was primarily acquired in daily practice, via emulation, following mostly unwritten and unspoken rules. Novels are by far the richest sources on greeting etiquette. When greeting gestures are being mentioned in a novel, we might consider them just one element of the mimetically thick description of characters' lifeworlds in novels. In numerous cases, though, the details can be shown to be significant, either contributing to characterisation, or telling something about the characters' relationship, or about the situation. In some precious rare instances, greeting gestures are explicitly being commented on by the characters themselves, typically either when criticizing a case of blatant rule transgression, or when a relationship is being renegotiated. The present paper looks at three Ming novels, Shuihu zhuan (ca. 1550s), Jin ping mei (ca. 1617) and Xingshi yinyuan zhuan (ca. 1661) from the perspective of greeting gestures. Shuihu zhuan, while betraying Ming influences, is still firmly rooted in the Song, whereas both Jin ping mei and Xingshi yinyuan zhuan are believed to represent their authors' contemporary late-Ming lifeworlds. A comparison of the vernacular semantics of greeting gestures in these three novels offers insights into significant historical shifts. In the two late-Ming works, the manipulation of greeting gesture gradually emerges as a social skill that facilitates clever but ruthless social climbers' access to wealth and power. They also include comments on greeting gestures that are indicative of a value system in a state of flux.

Clothing and Ornaments Writing in Huaben Stories and Rewriting Dramas

Wang Yiwen

Yiwen Wang, B.A. Zhejiang University. M.A.Taiwan University. Ph.D student, Zhejiang University. Visiting scholar, Stanford University. Fields: classical and vernacular novels of the Ming and Qing Dynasties.

Abstract — This paper compares the descriptions of female's makeup, appearance and clothing difference of both gender in representative Huaben stories with the original texts written in classic Chinese. The writers of Huaben, like Sanyan, Erpai and Yixing, have inherent gender prejudice when rewriting the clothes and costumes and facial makeup of characters in classical Chinese sketches, and the writing of both sexes also has symbolic characteristics. In the funny cross-dressing writing, clothing becomes a symbol to define the standards of propriety and indecency. There is also a difference in the author's attention to construct their gender symbols. Compared with the increasing writing in the details of male clothing, they only copied the female's makeup and clothing from the classical Chinese sketches, which corresponds to the author's negligence in the female portrayal. In contrast, the stylized description of makeup, face and clothing in dramas adapted from Huaben stories is keeping the traditional lyricism in Poem writing, although it still does not reflect the typical makeup in that period, but shapes the poetic symbols of ambiguous gender. The stage performance of drama highlights the poetic characteristics of gender symbols and weakens gender discrimination naturally. Keywords: Huaben story, Gender, rewriting, drama, narration

Tracing back Suzhou-hair: The Formation of the Female Hairdressing Business in the Vernacular Literature in Jiangnan

Xu Ning

The University of Hong-Kong ( Hong Kong SAR China) — XU Ning is a PhD candidate from the School of Chinese, the University of Hong Kong. She received her B.A. and M.A. degrees in the School of Chinese Language and Literature, Beijing Normal University. Her ongoing research focuses on self-employed women in Ming and Qing literature. She will explore the work, income, and social identity of the female hairdressers, the hotel lady, the bistro singing lady, etc., through the analysis of fictionalized narrative, drama and other materials. CHEN Yeju is currently a PhD candidate in Economics at the University of Hong Kong. His main research interest is the formative impacts of sociological as well as cultural or ideological backgrounds on economic institutions in the history of China.

Abstract — The saying of Suzhou-hair, which was widely circulated after the Qing Dynasty, differs from the traditional sense of women's hairstyles in that it was based on paid professional hair services. The narrative collections published in the 17th and the 18th centuries in Suzhou and Hangzhou, such as Xingshi Hengyan, Wusheng xi,Fengliu wu, etc., reflect the formation of the female hairdressing business in Jiangnan. Ladies and madams can receive professional hair styling thanks to the emergence of female hairdressers, referred to as nü daizhao or biniang in the vernacular literature. They were discriminated against in violation of the gender rules at that time, and therefore their professionalism and commercial value were not recognized in most of the texts. However, the paper argues that the female hairdressers, who specialized in serving wealthy female clients, outperformed their male counterparts in terms of skills, tools, earnings, etc. after a comparison of narratives between these two groups. The peony-hair, considered as one of the representatives of the Suzhou-hair, was probably promoted by the local female hairdressers. The vernacular literature then documents an important historical change in women's hairstyles in Jiangnan since the late Ming: the development from domestic service to market behaviour. It is on this basis that Suzhou-hair can be recognized as a regional signature.

Your Scars Tell — The Representation of Tattoos in the Shuihu zhuan

Raffaela Rettinger

Julius-Maximilians-Universitaet Wuerzburg ( Germany) — I hold a master's degree in Sinology and a Certificate in Intercultural Communication from Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich (LMU). During my bachelor's program, I spent a semester abroad at Beijing Normal University, China. Furthermore, as recipient of a one-year PROSA-scholarship I further deepened my Chinese Studies research as well as my knowledge of Japanese language and culture at Osaka University, Japan. I graduated in 2021 with a study on premodern Chinese literature. Since September 2021 I have been a research and teaching assistant at the Sinology department of JMU Wuerzburg.

Abstract — As one of the Four Great Classical Novels of Chinese Literature, the Shuihu zhuan 水滸傳 (Water Margins) has been used as a source of historical and socio-political research. One important aspect of the heroes of this novel has, until now, often been neglected: their tattoos. Some of the Liangshan bandits' tattoos, such as Lu Zhishen's 鲁智深 serve as body ornament, others are marks of punishment by the state, such as the ones of Song Jiang 宋江. The use of tattoos in the novel and their portrayal offers a great insight into society's view on tattoos. Moreover, it allows to compare their usage in a fictional context to the historical customs of tattooing. In this paper, I will compare the usage of tattoos in the novel with practices mentioned in historical and legal documents of the Song 宋 (960–1279). The focus lies on how tattoos are depicted, how their implementation influences the narrative and how they are linked with the cultural memory and knowledge of the audience. For the historical usage of tattoos, I will concentrate on Song sources since the novel is based within the time framework of the Song-Emperor Huizong 徽宗 (1082–1135, r. 1100–1125). Aspects such as the practice of tattooing criminals and soldiers, as well as the characters used to describe these procedures will be compared to the depiction and usage in the Shuihu zhuan. This not only will shine a light on the historical accuracy, but also help to understand the socio-political circumstances as well as the perception of tattoos and tattooed people during the time. It allows to further grasp the social status and value of tattooed bandits in history, their portrayal in the novel itself and the readers' perception of the text.

SESSION: EVERYDAY LIFE AND CUSTOMS

The Romance of Gambling in the Late Imperial Vernacular Stories

Chen Jiayi

University of Chicago ( United States) — Jiayi Chen is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations at the University of Chicago, with a concentration on late imperial Chinese literature. Her dissertation studies the interplay between games and literature in China from the sixteenth to the eighteenth centuries. Situated at the crossings of literary studies, game studies, and visual studies, it explores games both as a topos of literary imagination in novels, short stories, and plays, and as a mechanism of reading fictional writings. She also holds broader interests in the practices and representations of storytelling, text-image relations, and Sino-Japanese cultural exchange.

Abstract — This paper examines the representations of gambling in the late Ming and early Qing vernacular stories (huaben 話本). By focusing on two stories by Feng Menglong 馮夢龍 (1574-1646) and Li Yu 李漁 (1611-1680), I show how the game, which usually starts as a trivial everyday activity, can be aggravated into a gamble on life and death. These late imperial literary imaginations, which I refer to as the “romance of gambling,” were realized by the authors' deft treatment of the narrative: inventing the supernatural characters, multiplying the points of view, and interconnecting the narrative layers. Through these narrative techniques, they negate an explicit moral message on the page. Rather, being aware of the commodity nature of their own writings, these authors invite the readers to experience a metagame of gambling: it is the uncertainty about the precise message that entices the readers to continuously flip over the pages, hoping that at some moment they could discover the truth left by the authors. In sum, I argue that the vernacular stories, rather than novels, offer the authors an innovative and ideal testing ground to explore both the theme of gambling and the nature of vernacular stories as a literary genre, revealing through their interplay the complex tensions between money and fate, chance and control, ordinary and extraordinary.

The Household Servants of Lin Lan Xiang 林蘭香

Barbara Witt

National Chengchi University ( Taiwan) — Barbara Witt is a Postdoc at the Research Center for Chinese Cultural Subjectivity and adjunct Assistant Professor at the Religious Studies Graduate Center, National Chengchi University in Taipei. Her research interests include vernacular religious novels, women in late imperial vernacular fiction, and social network analysis. She graduated with a PhD in Sinology from the Institute of Sinology at LMU Munich and was formerly employed as assistant professor and adjunct lecturer at the Institute of Sinology at JMU Würzburg.

Abstract — Elite households of late imperial China were run by a substantial work force of household servants (jiapu 家僕), sometimes up to a hundred people strong. Such servants were generally born into servitude and bound to their elite masters across many generations. Despite their lowly (jian 賤) legal status, they were thought of as integral part of the elite families they served, as evident by the use of terms such as jiaren 家人, “family members”. While evidence of these household servants can be found in laws and legal documents of the late imperial period, such historical records report very little about how these household servants negotiated their marginal role as both slave and family member. Vernacular novels such as Jin Ping Mei 金瓶梅, Honglou meng 紅樓夢 or Lin Lan Xiang 林蘭香 might be able to provide insight into the nature of their interactions within the household, by providing us with detailed description of the everyday culture of elite households, including its many servants. Focusing on the Qing dynasty novel Lin Lan Xiang, this paper will take a closer look at descriptions of servants in vernacular novels and discuss both merits and limits of such a source. While the novel features a surprising amount of information on labor organization within elite households, its narrative focus only rests on servants if it serves to highlight its elite protagonists. Much attention is given to young maids (shinü 侍女), who are often given starring roles, while other servants function as extras in the background, further distorting the picture. To derive much needed knowledge from the narrative, it is therefore necessary to navigate these limitations and to use novels such as Lin Lan Xiang in tandem with other historical sources available.

Bribery and Corruption in Canton: The Circulation of Foreign Objects in the Early Nineteenth Century Novel Shenlou zhi 蜃樓志

Rubén Jesús Almendros Peñaranda 

Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales ( France) — Rubén Almendros is a contractual PhD candidate in Premodern Chinese Literature at the Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales (Inalco Paris), where he also teaches Chinese language and methodology courses. His thesis topic focuses on the representation of the foreign presence in relation to the decline of the empire in 19th century Chinese novels.

Abstract — An exotic pocket watch, foreign liquor, Dutch camels, Western cloud and rain beds... Shenlou zhi 蜃樓志 (1804), the first Chinese novel to describe foreign trade in the port of Canton, is not only a mirror of the Hong merchants system in the Jiaqing era (1796-1820) of the Qing dynasty (1644-1912), but also a source of knowledge about the circulation of foreign objects in Guangdong. Western goods are the only trace of foreign traders in Shenlou zhi as they are not represented nor do they play an active role in the plot. Therefore, an analysis of the circulation, usage and moments of appearance of these products is the only way to obtain information about the organisation of the Canton system as a whole, including the European supercargoes. Furthermore, an even deeper reading can reveal a value judgement on foreigners and Chinese institutions. This paper will show how the appearance of foreign objects in Shenlou zhi is related to institutional and moral corruption. On the one hand, the Western luxury products offered as bribes or gifts from Chinese merchants to their superiors evince a corrupt system touching the entire bureaucracy and even the emperor. On the other hand, foreign sex-related objects are linked to depravity. Despite all this, no anti-foreigner or moralistic discourse concerning sexual relations could be identified on the part of the author.